Q. Could you explain what is going on with the latest fruit fly quarantine? I heard that the Department of Agriculture was stripping fruit from trees in Redlands.
A few weeks ago I wrote about the Asian citrus psyllid, its role in spreading citrus greening disease (HLB), and what we, as home gardeners, can do to help. Now there is an additional quarantine that is targeted at the oriental fruit fly (Bactrocera dorsalis). Many people (including some master gardeners) have questions about the two different quarantines and what they mean.
The Asian citrus psyllid does not cause direct harm to citrus except that some psyllids carry the HLB disease. I would compare it to the role of mosquitoes and malaria. Not all mosquitoes can give you malaria, but it’s important to keep their population under control so we don’t have a malaria outbreak.
The oriental fruit fly, however, directly damages over 400 different types of fruit. It is an invasive pest that originated in Southeast Asia and first appeared in Florida in 2002. It’s slightly bigger than the average housefly – a little less than ½ inch long. It’s yellow with a black “T” on its abdomen. It has clear wings and the females have a prominent ovipositor (a pointy structure that allows it to deposit egg inside fruit).
Once the eggs hatch, many larvae emerge and feast on the fruit’s flesh. They are slightly less than ½ inch long and pale yellow/white. Of course, this makes the fruit disgusting and inedible. If you thought finding a coddling moth larva in your apple was bad, try finding hundreds of “disco rice” in your fruit!
Since the oriental fruit fly can infest almost any type of fruit, it can potentially cost billions of dollars in lost crops. Fortunately, it doesn’t appear to have spread too far – yet.
I think we can all agree that we don’t want to find a party in our produce, so here are some recommendations for helping to stop the spread of this particularly odious pest.
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Don’t move produce or plants that have not been inspected. Bringing produce home from the grocery store is okay because that has been inspected. Unfortunately, bringing your neighbor or coworkers a bag of fruit from your own tree is not OK. If you have more citrus than you can consume, you can juice it or make limoncello to share. Making marmalade, jelly, jam, curd, or candied citrus peel to share is also okay. Just don’t move unprocessed and/or uninspected produce from your property because you may end up sharing more than just fruit.
Please allow workers from the Department of Agriculture to do their work. They may have to inspect your trees, spray, or set traps. If they inspect and find the pest, they will strip the tree of its fruit and dispose of it safely. They may spray pesticide but will always notify before doing so and will make every effort to minimize exposure to bees and other beneficial insects. The traps contain small amounts of insecticide and a pheromone to attract male flies.
For more information and current maps of the quarantine areas, see www.cdfa.ca.gov.
Los Angeles County
mglosangeleshelpline@ucdavis.edu; 626-586-1988; http://celosangeles.ucanr.edu/UC_Master_Gardener_Program/
Orange County
ucceocmghotline@ucanr.edu; http://mgorange.ucanr.edu/
Riverside County
anrmgriverside@ucanr.edu; https://ucanr.edu/sites/RiversideMG/
San Bernardino County
mgsanbern@ucanr.edu; 909-387-2182; http://mgsb.ucanr.edu